On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 08:35:13 GMT, John Santos
wrote:

In article ,
says...
"Bruce Barnett" wrote in message
...
Just Wondering writes:

OK, I'll bite. In the context of going to a world without an internet
to a world with an internet, what's the difference between saying
create and saying invent?

As the Snopes page said - Eisenhower took the initiative in creating
the Interstate Highway System. He did not invent the highway.

Which isn't even close to being on point. Eisenhower was in office from
1953-1961. The Federal-Aid Highway Act was passed in 1956. So, Eisenhower
can rightly claim the initiative in creating the Interstate Highway System.
In contrast, Gore was not yet in office when the Internet was first created.
Perhaps he could rightly say that he took the initiative to expand the
Internet, but that doesn't sound nearly as good saying you created it, so
being a politician, he said the latter. In the end, I don't really care.
The way he said it left him wide open for jokes to be made. You can't deny
that it sounds funny, can you?

todd

Highways existed long before Eisenhower was elected president. It
is exactly on point.


... and as far as I know, Eisenhower never made a statement that said,
"While president, I took the initiative in creating highway systems". The
interstate highway system was a considerable advancement over the existing
highway systems in place -- compare Route 66 with Interstate 10 -- a
completely different travel model. Ike came back from Germany tremendously
impressed with the Autobahn and the ability to move military materiel
rapidly.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with the Al Gore statement. The fact
is, in the heat of a political election season, Al Gore made a statement
wildly inflating his importance in the construction of an important element
of national infrastructure. Even apologists for Gore ought to be able to
see that his claim was wildly inflated and he did it solely for the purpose
of gaining standing in the eyes of potential voters. The fact that he got
called on it should surprise no one. Just as his claims to have
"discovered" Love Canal, or to have been the model for the main character
of a novel that became a major motion picture were designed to serve the
same purpose.

Eisenhower proposed legislation to build a new highway system.

Gore sponsored a bill to enable public and commercial use of what
had been to that point solely a military, government and academic
network.

Neither one of them swung a shovel or crimped a connector or designed
an overpass or wrote an RFC.


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If you're gonna be dumb, you better be tough

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